Thunderstruck
In Thunderstruck, Erik Larson tells the interwoven stories of two men—Hawley Crippen, a very unlikely murderer, and Guglielmo Marconi, the obsessive creator of a seemingly supernatural means of communication—whose lives intersect during one of the greatest criminal chases of all time.
Set in Edwardian London and on the stormy coasts of Cornwall, Cape Cod, and Nova Scotia, Thunderstruck evokes the dynamism of those years when great shipping companies competed to build the biggest, fastest ocean liners, scientific advances dazzled the public with visions of a world transformed, and the rich outdid one another with ostentatious displays of wealth. Against this background, Marconi races against incredible odds and relentless skepticism to perfect his invention: the wireless, a prime catalyst for the emergence of the world we know today. Meanwhile, Crippen, “the kindest of men,” nearly commits the perfect crime.
With his superb narrative skills, Erik Larson guides these parallel narratives toward a relentlessly suspenseful meeting on the waters of the North Atlantic. Along the way, he tells of a sad and tragic love affair that was described on the front pages of newspapers around the world, a chief inspector who found himself strangely sympathetic to the killer and his lover, and a driven and compelling inventor who transformed the way we communicate. Thunderstruck presents a vibrant portrait of an era of séances, science, and fog, inhabited by inventors, magicians, and Scotland Yard detectives, all presided over by the amiable and fun-loving Edward VII as the world slid inevitably toward the first great war of the twentieth century. Gripping from the first page, and rich with fascinating detail about the time, the people, and the new inventions that connect and divide us, Thunderstruck is splendid narrative history from a master of the form.
Review: In Thunderstruck, Larson interweaves the stories of Guglielmo Marconi, creater of the wireless telegraph, and Hawley Crippen, a gentle and kind man turned murderer. The structure of this novel closely mirrors that of Larson's popular The Devil in the White City, which also deals with a well known public figure contrasted with a murderer.
Larson's writing is compelling and narrative-like in structure. He does an excellent job of creating suspense for his readers, deftly interweaving chapters of the two storylines to delay the great reveal of the murder. Unlike many non-fiction works, which tend to take me longer to read than novels, I flew through this book. Crippen presented a fascinating story. A man described as "docile as a kitten" seems to have systematically dismembered and disposed of his wife (48). Yet he failed to cover all his tracks, lacking a good cover story for her disappearance and allowing his new lover wear his former wife's clothing about. There were so many odd details that Larson included that are never resolved - why does Crippen suddenly start going by Peter? Why did Crippen, after years of abuse from his wife, suddenly snap? Why did his wife report an odd incidence where she woke up "stifling" a few weeks before her death?
However, despite how much I enjoyed this, my same frustration with The Devil in the White City recurred in this book. I had a much greater interest in the story of Crippen and his missing wife than I did in Marconi's storyline. Although Marconi's life is interesting and filled with new discoveries, wealth, and prominent individuals, it's hard to compete with the gristly murder of the Crippen storyline. Furthermore, the connection between the two storylines is tenuous at best. Crippen is apprehended at sea because the detective was able to send a telegraph to shore that he was on board, alerting the world that the infamous murderer was on board. In trying to elude police, Crippen had "forgotten, if he ever knew, what Marconi had done for the world, which was now rapidly shrinking. So we see two hunted creatures, say a fox and a hare, with millions of hounds baying and slavering after them" (341). Yet it seems like a very slight intersection to base a joint book off of. Larsen does argue that "the Crippen saga did more to accelerate the acceptance of wireless as a practical tool than anything the Marconi company previously had attempted" (369), yet I'm not convinced the two stories align well enough to warrant a dual history.
Stars: 4
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